Between your laptop, smartphone, smart TV, and perhaps a virtual assistant, how many microphones are in your home? The number of households with a hands-free assistant is growing by millions each year, but their convenience may come at a price. With law enforcement already using smart-device collected data as evidence, digital privacy rights are becoming more important. Amazon's ... Echo family of devices are all variations on the theme of a smart speaker that can listen to, understand, and respond to voice commands. Like Siri's implementation in recent iOS devices ... the device is always listening, so you don't have to put down what you're doing and find your phone to get an answer. But some worry there's a fine line between always listening, and always recording. Are we truly alone when we're with our devices? Amazon maintains a database of your conversations with the Echo. Police in Bentonville, Ark. have already submitted a search warrant for "audio recordings, transcribed records, and other text records" from the Echo of 2015 murder suspect James Andrew Bates. Amazon refused to turn over data from its servers beyond basic account information, [but] this case should be a wake-up call. The Fourth Amendment establishes the "sanctity of the home," which prevents law enforcement from an unjustified search of a house. The "third-party doctrine," [however] permits police to access information voluntarily shared with a third party such as your bank or phone company, even without a warrant.
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